


the underside of the coffee table

by avxry



Category: Deadpool (Movieverse)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Time Travel, pre-deadpool wade wilson, the author doesn't know anything about deadpool or cable outside the movie, the teen rating is really just for the swearing, unfortunately out of character, vanessa is mentioned solely to make it a lil sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-09-29 04:56:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17196935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/avxry/pseuds/avxry
Summary: One minute, Nate Summers was fighting alongside the mismatched members of X-Force, and the next minute, he was falling through an all-too-familiar plane of existence, void of time and space.





	the underside of the coffee table

**Author's Note:**

> this is my very first work for nate/wade so if it seems like my characterization is off, it's because it is :) i'm still not super familiar with either character, so this was kind of my first attempt at getting into the community
> 
> i've read more fanfic about these two than i care to admit at this point, and this was one idea that i had that i really wanted to explore, but it's really just the skeleton of the idea. i wanted it to be much more developed than it is, but this is what i've got. still, hope y'all enjoy :)))

One minute, Nate Summers was fighting alongside the mismatched members of X-Force, and the next minute, he was falling through an all-too-familiar plane of existence, void of time and space.

Keeping his time-travelling device with him was just habit at this point. Nothing could come of it, because of the two energy blasts it had, one was used to go back in time and stop Russell Collins, and the other was used to save Wade Wilson. So even if something weird were to happen to it, like getting hit by an accidental electrical charge from the mutant kid that Nate was trying to subdue without killing, everything should be fine.

Well - that’s what he thought.

Clearly, he was wrong; an electric pulse from that mutant kid (a neat little guy who had decided to use his ability to harvest and control electrical currents for destruction) shot straight into his time travel device and the world went bright.

It didn’t make any sense that the device could send him spiraling through time again. The energy pulses were used up, and something as simple as a bolt of electricity could start it up again. It’s kind of too much for Nate to think about while his body is being flung around the space-time continuum, especially when the biggest question concerns where and when he’s going to end up.

He has only a brief moment to wonder if he’s going backward or forward in time before he lands hard on concrete, his head swimming and his limbs tingling with numbness. His senses slowly come back to him, and he can see that it’s nearly dark where he is - and _where he is_ appears to be some dirty alley. He’s in the middle of coughing and trying to stand up when he realizes that he isn’t alone.

“Holy shit, where’d you come from?”

The voice is almost familiar, but Nate’s perception is still off the rails. “What year is it?”

“That was fucking awesome!” the voice exclaims, as if Nate hadn’t spoken at all. “What is that, like, a superpower? Teleportation? Are you, like, a low-budget Avenger?”

“ _What year is it_?” Nate asks again in annoyance, rising to his feet to turn and look at the person talking to him. It was a man, standing about twenty feet away, grocery bags in his hands. He is so close to being familiar, as if he were on one of those stupid TV shows Wade makes him watch.

“That’s always a question that people from the future ask,” the guy says, raising an eyebrow. “Oh my god, you’re a time-traveler. Is this, like, a three wishes type deal? _Oh_ \- who wins _The Voice_ \- no, wait, I take it back, that doesn’t count -”

“Never mind,” Nate grumbles, flexing his shoulders and wrists, feeling his body become his own again. He starts to walk the opposite direction when the guy calls out again.

“No, wait, sorry, it’s 2013,” he says, “don’t go. You’re gonna be my coolest friend. None of my other friends can time travel.”

Nate stops in his tracks. _It’s 2013?_ _Five years in the past. Fuck_.

“I’ve got to get back,” Nate says to himself, but, of course, the man hears him.

“Back to when?” he asks. “Back to the future? Ohmygod that’s awesome. What time are you from -”

“Will you shut up?” Nate interrupts in a distracted, almost-growl. The phrase is so familiar that it sparks something in his brain, and he finally takes a good look at the man in front of him.

He’s tall, with short-cropped hair and scruff on his jaw and high cheekbones. His grin is just a bit lopsided, a smirk that knows no consequences, and that’s when Nate sees it.

“Wade?”

The man narrows his eyes immediately. He drops the grocery bags in his right hand and pulls a gun from his waistband in one swift movement, aiming it directly at Nate’s head with precision.

“Now, what makes you say that?” he asks playfully, but there’s a bite in his voice - one that Nate knows well.

He throws his hands up. “Whoa, relax. I’m not an enemy.”

“I’ve got enemies who’ve got friends,” Wade says, cocking his gun dramatically. “And the friend of my enemy whose enemy is me is no friend of mine and is also my enemy.”

Nate squints his eyes in annoyance. Only Wade could say that flawlessly and with a straight face. “I know you in the future. We’re tog - we’re friends.”

Wade raises an eyebrow, considering this for a moment. Nate tries to make his most earnest face, but it probably comes out in a scowl. He feels confident that Wade isn’t going to shoot him point blank. Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s incredibly comfortable with that gun pointed at his face.

“Put the fucking gun down, please,” he says, hands still up in surrender. “I’m not gonna kill you.”

Wade lowers his gun and slides it back into his waistband as quickly as he brought it out. “Psh, you couldn’t even if - wait a second . . . Is your hand fucking metal?”

Nate rolls his eyes. Even five years in the past, Wade is still obsessed with his virus.

“Yes.”

“Holy shitballs,” Wade says, approaching in pure curiosity, having no sense of personal space. “That’s so fucking hot. Is that how you time travel?”

 _Of course Wade thinks it’s attractive. Some things never change. Or won’t change. Whatever_.

“No,” Nate says.

“Well, come on, stop holding out,” Wade replies, walking back to grab the bags he dropped on the ground. “What are you doing here - ah, fuck, the eggs.”

Nate doesn’t reply as Wade walks toward him and then past him, grumbling about what a mess the eggs are in the bag and how it’s all over his Moon Pies. Nate watches with an eyebrow raised as Wade approaches the end of the alley.

Wade finally turns around. “You coming?”

Nate wants to say no. Surely, it’s a bad idea. But what other choice does he have?

*****

Nate didn’t get a word in on the entire walk to wherever Wade was taking them - which turned out to be Wade’s apartment. It was surprisingly cozy - much different from Wade’s and Nate’s shared apartment, which is, Nate realizes, in the future, not even created yet. He gets a familiar ache in his chest that comes with being lost in the past, disconnected from his family.

It’s almost easy to push that feeling away when Wade tells him to have a seat on the stool in the kitchen while he puts away the groceries.

“My humble abode,” Wade chatters on, “shared with the love of my life. It’d be paradise if it weren’t for the bullet holes and the crime rate of the area. Oh, who am I kidding, it wouldn’t be paradise without ‘em.”

Not to be sappy or anything, but Nate is kind of mesmerized by Wade and how different and similar this version of him is. It’s still jokes and ridiculousness, but it’s not desperate or sad or self-deprecating. It’s so different and so familiar. Nate just keeps staring.

“What are you staring at?” Wade asks him, not even stopping what he’s doing to wait for an answer. “I mean, I get it, I’m totally gorgeous, but I’m taken. Ooh, Nessa’s super cool, through, she might be into a threesome if you talk to her about it.”

Nate feels a pang of sadness on Wade’s behalf at the mention of Vanessa. Nate knew next to nothing about her except she was the love of Wade’s life and she was killed. Would be killed.

“You just look different,” Nate says simply.

Wade lets out a dramatic gasp and turns to face Nate with too much gusto. “Oh god - don’t tell me I go bald in the future.”

Nate finds it in him to chuckle. “Something like that.”

“Hell no,” Wade says, resuming his task, “I’d rather die before I lose these stunning good looks.”

And now that just makes Nate sad. He missed _his_ Wade already.

“Listen,” he says, trying to change the subject, “I need to get back.”

“What time are you from?” Wade asks excitedly. “Is it super cool there? Futurama-esque? Flying cars? Are Heelys legal again? Please tell me there’s a female president.”

“This planet during my time is a wasteland,” Nate says, “but I’m coming from just five years ahead.”

“So you’re from the future from the future?” Wade asks, leaning on the counter to squint at Nate critically. “That’s kinda wild.”

“Yes, it is,” Nate replies. “My time-travelling device was supposed to have two charges, one to take me to the past and one to return me to the future. I ended up using them both and remaining in the past, but something happened, and I was sent back here, even further.”

Wade raised an eyebrow. “So you magically went back in time and found me, specifically, your future bro?”

“It’s not magic, and we’re hardly ‘bros,’” Nate grunts. “But yes.”

“Coincidence?”

“Probably.”

“I think not!”

Nate sighs and shakes his head. “I just need to get back.”

“Tired of me already, metal man?”

Nate purses his lips. “No, you’re just - you’re not the Wade that I know.”

“Psh, how different could I really be?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“If you were really my friend, you would know that saying that would just make me want to know even more,” Wade says. He starts to say something persuasive to try to pry a story out of Nate, but Nate knows better.

“I won’t tell you anything,” he says. “Could mess up the timeline.”

“Bummer,” Wade grumbles. “Can’t believe I’m friends with a goody-two-shoes. Must be the metal arm that keeps me around.”

“Don’t doubt it.”

“So,” Wade says energetically, hopping up to sit on the counter and swing his legs like a child. “How do we get you back?”

“I’m not sure,” Nate admits, pulling out his time travel device and turning it over in his hands. “It started up again when it got hit by a bolt of electricity.”

“Ooh, you’re a handyman?” Wade says with wonder. “Always had a soft spot for hot electricians.”

“No,” Nate answers with a raised eyebrow. “Fighting.”

“Much more fun.”

“I don’t know why it worked or how to get it to work again.”

“Well,” Wade shrugs, “seeing as the author doesn’t really know anything about the mechanics of that time travel device, this should be easy.”

Nate scrunched up his eyebrows in confusion at both Wade’s comment and his assumption that anything about this would be easy. “What?”

“Set the device to either reverse the last travel or go to the date that you want,” Wade says as if it’s obvious.

“It definitely can’t just ‘reverse’ a travel,” Nate rolls his eyes, but as he fiddles with the device, he wonders aloud, “but maybe if we could replicate the same amount of force that hit it and sent me backwards, it would send me forward about the same amount of time.”

“Is there a setting for forward and backward?”

“Yes - it was set to backward because of my last travel.”

“So switch it up,” Wade suggests. “Set it to go forward, we replicate the amount of electricity, and hope the shock doesn’t turn you into a fish stick.”

Nate considers how crazy he’s being and how dumb of an idea this is, but he finally decides that he really doesn’t have another option.

“Alright. How do we replicate it?”

*****

After about forty five minutes of Wade suggesting they just dip Nate’s metal arm in water to make it go haywire and then touching the time travel device, they decide that a taser is the best idea. Nate isn’t too crazy about it, but it’s definitely better than humoring Wade’s idea of turning him into a human toaster.

“I’m assuming you have a taser?” Nate asks, already knowing the answer.

“Ha! Do I have a taser - of _course_ I have a taser!” Wade rolls his eyes. “I carry three guns on my hip at all times, and I even point one at you when you pop outta nowhere and you ask me if I have a _taser_ . Of _course_ I have a taser.”

Nate involuntarily rolls his eyes. “Then let’s see it.”

“A man on a mission,” Wade nods, “I like it. Taser’s taped to the underside of the coffee table.”

Nate can’t help but smile to himself a little, letting out a bit of a chuckle. “I should have known.”

“You should have?”

“It’s where you keep our stun gun in the future.”

“Nice to know I don’t change too mu - wait, _our_ stun gun?”

Nate raises an eyebrow and wonders how he’ll get around explaining this one. He doesn’t really feel like going through the story of how he and Wade ended up getting an apartment together out of necessity and then becoming strangely good friends and then becoming vital to each other’s lives and then kinda of maybe starting to care about each other. And how they share a stun gun that Wade taped to the underside of the coffee table. Along with a set of pistols, kitchen utensils, and a bed. That seems like a lot to explain.

“Yes,” Nate says, “we didn’t need two.”

Wade scoffs, hopping up on the counter and staring at Nate intently. “I’m more concerned with the fact that we’re sharing it at all. Do we live together?”

“Yes,” Nate repeats, “out of necessity.” He crosses to the coffee table and reaches underneath, feeling around until he grabs the taser, ripping it off and bringing it in front of him to remove the tape.

“Necessity? What does that mean?” Wade asks, swinging his legs as much as he can without kicking the cabinets. “Why is it a necessity that you live with me and Vanessa?”

Nate feels a painful pang in his heart. _Vanessa_. This is becoming too difficult. He needs to get back immediately. He tries to not noticeably freeze as he walks back over to Wade and hands him the stun gun.

“Can’t say too much, might ruin the timeline,” Nate mumbles, hoping that Wade buys the excuse.

“Ooh, top secret,” Wade replies conspiratorially, wiggling his fingertips and his eyebrows. Nate stares at him again; he can’t help it. This Wade is so different. Sure, he’s conventionally attractive, but that’s not what Nate is concerned with - it’s his behavior, more comfortable and bouncy, less devil-may-care and desperate. This Wade Wilson still has a spark behind his eyes (Nate has only seen it once or twice in _his_ Wade).

“Yes, it is,” Nate confirms, holding the taser out for Wade to take with his infected arm.

“Oh, yes, I definitely can see it,” Wade nods, making a smirk at Nate’s arm. “I’ve _always_ had a thing for metal limbs. I’d fuck Bucky Barnes if Cap wasn’t all over him. Yeah, we’re definitely gonna fuck in the future, aren’t we? Hell yes.”

Nate lets out an aggravated sigh and says, “Just tase the time device.”

Wade reaches for the taser but starts by dragging his fingertips along Nate’s forearm, making eye contact the entire time. Nate wants to pull away but instead just scowls with a sense of softness before Wade finally takes the taser.

“You’ve got the time turner set to the future?”

“Time turner?”

Wade raises an eyebrow, “ _Harry Potter_ ? Hermione’s time turner? Oh my god, don’t tell me you haven’t seen it. What the hell are we even doing five years in the future if not watching _Harry Potter_ ? When you get back, the first thing you say to future me better be, ‘Past you told me to tell you to watch _Harry Potter_ immediately.’”

Nate can’t help but twitch the corner of his lips up into a smile. “I will, if you ever fire that thing.”

“Alright, alright,” Wade says, sliding off the counter, adjusting the taser in his hands. “Get ready.”

Nate braces himself, checking one last time that the time device is set to go forward. He puts it back in place, where it was when that mutant kid hit it with an electric bolt, and grounds himself steadily.

“Ready.”

Wade grins, says, “Cowabunga, future lover,” and shoots the taser.

And Nate is spinning through nothingness again.

*****

His stomach churns in an unfortunately familiar way, and he knows that their ridiculous plan has worked, at least when it comes to getting the time device to react. His body _feels_ as if it’s going forward in time, but he’s probably just projecting.

He can’t tell how long he’s travelling, which, he guess, is the whole point, seeing as time doesn’t actually exist in this little vacuum. All he knows is that his skin feels tingly and unsettled when he lands hard on concrete (again? really?) and rolls over on his side with a little groan.

Luckily, there are no screams or shouts around him, so he assumes that no one saw him appear. He soon realizes that it’s because it’s dark outside and probably incredibly late, judging from the lack of motion around him.

He climbs to his feet with a grunt, stretching and popping his back before taking a look at his surroundings. He landed on a sidewalk in a rather deserted part of the city that he’s come to know. He’s been here before, with Wade.

One glance at the row of stores behind him assures him that he knows where he is; that little bread shop that Wade insisted they visit, right beside the Voodoo Vape Shop, which were basically relics in Nate's time.

He still has no way of knowing what year he’s in, if he actually went forward in time or not, but he figures his best bet is to make his way in the direction of where his and Wade’s apartment either is, will be, or was. With any luck, it’s where his and Wade’s apartment _is_.

He starts walking. If he remembers correctly, it’s about a forty-five minute walk from here. As he walks he sees hardly anyone, and assumes that it must be incredibly late at night. He starts getting into a section of the bigger city, and people and cars become much more frequent. He just minds his business and keeps his head down, just in case. He doesn’t know what he’s being cautious of, but being cautious never hurts.

Finally, he arrives at his apartment building and takes a deep breath for luck before making his way up the five flights of stairs to apartment 512. He hears the normal exclamations of laughter and arguments that he always has while walking through the building, but still nothing that tells him to any degree of certainty what year he has landed in.

He comes to a halt in front of what he hopes is his apartment. He reaches into his pocket, digging around for the key that he hopes hasn’t fallen out of his pocket in all the excitement. He interprets it as a good sign when the key is still there.

Praying that he won’t get shot by some unwitting resident behind the door, he sticks the key in the lock and turns it. Surely, it’s a good thing that the key still fits, right?

He slowly, carefully, pushes open the door and is greeted with a sight that makes him release a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding. Wade is asleep on the couch, sitting upright and facing the television, the soft glow illuminating his face, gun in his hand.

Nate takes a step forward and the floor creaks beneath him. Wade is awake and pointing a gun at him in less than a second. Nate throws his hands up and thinks bitterly that this is all too familiar.

“It’s just me,” he says in a low voice.

Wade stares at him blankly for just a moment before dropping his gun on the couch and charging at him. Nate is expecting a good, solid punch or even a shove, but Wade throws his arms around his neck and clings to him tightly.

“You were gone for over a week, you fucker!”

Nate wraps his arms around Wade’s torso and hugs him back tightly, shutting his eyes at the relief he feels, knowing that he’s back in the right time. He doesn’t say anything, just holds Wade closely, thinking about past Wade and how much he missed _his_.

Wade pulls back suddenly and slaps him on the shoulder. “What the fuck happened? One second, we were fighting kid-Radioshack and the next you were just gone like the fucking wind!”

“He hit my time travel device,” Nate explains, stepping forward and turning to shut the door behind him. “Went back in time a few years.” He turns back and takes Wade’s face in his hands. “You fixed it.” He kisses him deeply before Wade can ask what the hell he means by that.

Wade kisses back, taking a step to push Nate back against the door and hold his hips tightly, as if grounding him in the present. Nate breathes through his nose and rearranges his arms so that he can pull him even closer.

Wade pulls away abruptly to say, “What does that mean? How did I fix it? You know that I’m usually the one who breaks things -”

“I landed in front of you,” Nate explains, fingers tangled up in Wade’s shirt. “Five years ago.”

“If the Marvel Cinematic Universe knew how to create a plot without loopholes, I’d remember that happening to me, but for consistency’s sake, you’ll have to explain.”

“I went back five years, and you were there,” Nate says. “You took me back to your apartment -”

“Ooh, kinky -”

“And we used a taser to replicate the electrical shock from that kid,” Nate finishes. “I just got lucky that it was basically the same thing and sent me back here.”

“Yeah, a week late!” Wade exclaims, disconnected from Nate and pacing around the room dramatically. “I was pulling my hair out! I mean, figuratively, not literally, of course, I don’t have any fuckin hair, I’m a wrinkly human mole rat -”

Wade’s face drops as he looks at Nate with an expression too conflicted for Nate to understand. Wade says quietly, “And now you’ve seen me pre-mole rat.”

Nate takes a pause of understanding. Still, he says, “So What?”

“I was practically a male model five years ago, not to toot my own horn -”

“You love to do that -”

“And now, I look like a craisin, and not even the good kind,” Wade says, “I look like the kind that come in the little boxes and get all squished together and sticky -”

“I like you better this way,” Nate interrupts him, walking toward him.

Wade gives him a withering look. “Now, that’s just absurd.”

Nate shakes his head, winding his arms around Wade’s hips gently and pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Five years ago, you weren’t _my_ Wade Wilson.”

This seems to stop Wade in his tracks. After a moment, he allows himself to almost fall into Nate’s embrace, hugging him back fiercely.

Nate gives him one last squeeze and pulls away, starting toward the bedroom to change his clothes. “There _is_ something we still have to do.”

“What’s that, Cable Protector?”

“You told me to tell you that I have to watch _Harry Potter_.”

“Let me guess - I made a time turner joke and you didn’t get it.”

Nate laughs. “You know yourself so well.”

“Hey, Nate?” Wade asks in a voice that’s too small for his usual confidence.

Nate looks back at him with a concerned look. “Yes, Wade?”

Wade gives him an all-too-honest smile. “Thanks for coming back.”

Nate nearly crumbles at the implication. _He could have gone further ahead_. He nods once with a solemn look. “I already used one last-chance time travel for you. Figured I should probably be consistent.”

Wade grins wide, and Nate sees that little glint in his eye that he noticed five years ago.

“Love you, too, Nate.”

**Author's Note:**

> i hope it wasn't too cringey and out-of-character. it's also not really edited, so there are definitely some mistakes. 
> 
> some disclaimers: when wade said that the author didn't know anything about the time travel device, that was absolutely true. the entire premise of this fic is probably implausible, but i just genuinely don't know anything at all about it. my knowledge of anything to do with deadpool and cable comes exclusively from Deadpool 2 and their respective wikipedia pages. i've never read a single comic i'm sorry ! also concerning the Voodoo Vape Shop: i've never heard of it before and i made it up off the top of my head, but if it's actually a thing, this fic is in no way related or associated with it. one last thing: i also don't know a whole lot about the x-men or mutants, so if "kid-radioshack's" power is reminiscent of some other character, it was purely by accident.
> 
> i used to operate under the impression that i really really didn't like marvel, but now i'm realizing that i just really really don't like the avengers, because i'd die for wade wilson 
> 
> thank you for reading!! <3


End file.
